Photo Review: Caribbean Cruise Excursions (Disney Fantasy) - Tulum Ruins (Cozumel)

There are many, many options for excursions and what you can do in each port, so it can be difficult narrowing it down to the right activity, sights, shopping, etc.  I had a great time on my cruise last September to the Western Caribbean, and I thought I would share with you all what I did at the various stops.  Hopefully my experiences and insights will help others plan out their time better, and select excursions that really suit your party.



This will be a review of the Cozumel, Mexico stop only.  For other stops, look for future posts!

**If you are looking for a review of the ship & my stateroom, see this post.**

Departure Date: September 13, 2014
Departure Port:  Port Canaveral, Florida
Cruise Length: 7 days

Itinerary
Day 1	Embark/Sea Day
Day 2	Sea Day
Day 3	Cozumel, Mexico
Day 4	Grand Cayman
Day 5	Falmouth, Jamaica
Day 6	Sea Day
Day 7	Castaway Cay
Day 8	Disembark

Cozumel, Mexico - Tulum Ruins - $129 per adult

This was my second time in Cozumel, but the rest of my families first time here.  My dad had specifically mentioned wanting to visit some kind of ruins while on this trip, and I knew the perfect place to go.  

The Mayan Tulum Ruins are not on the island of Cozumel; you must take a 30-45 minute ferry ride to mainland Mexico and then a bus ride that takes about an hour after that.  We don't always book excursions through the cruise line, mainly because they are typically more expensive when you book with the cruise.  However, we booked this excursion through Disney for several reasons.  One, this excursion was quite lengthy, about 7 hours.  Because you only have a limited amount of time in each port, and you don't want to get left behind, booking through the cruise line makes sense.  They guarantee that they will not leave you behind on a cruise-booked excursion.  The other reason we booked this through Disney is because we didn't want to arrange the transfers from our ship to the ferry and then from a ferry to a bus in order to arrive at Tulum.

The ferry ride was actually quite enjoyable.  Disney provided motion sickness pills for all guests who wanted them before even departing the cruise ship, as well as suggesting we take a few towels.  I did not take my motion sickness pills because I wanted to see if I'd really even need them, as I have never been motion sick on the big cruise ships.  The ferry is much smaller in size, but still a very large boat, which probably seats 150 or so.  I sat outdoors on the second floor with my sister in a spot with fresh air blowing into my face.  The above deck seats are hard flat metal benches; not uncomfortable for the length of the trip.  They had an indoor section down a flight of stairs that was air conditioned and had more comfortable seats, as well.  The picture up above and to the left is a stock photo from the Mexico WaterJet's website.  It looks similar to the ferry we road on, except the back half had a more open feel to it.



After that, we arrived at the dock, where we followed one of our tour guides on a short walk to our motor coach (aka bus).  One slightly irritating thing was that our guides "required" us to take a picture with some rain forest-y greenery and ruin type thing behind us.  We could later purchase these photos for a small fee if we wished.  It was annoying because it took a good 20 minutes to get photos of every party in the group, when majority of the passengers didn't even purchase this photo.  The photo to the right was in the same general area as the required photo was.  Nothing that exciting.

To the left is an example of one of the shopping streets we walked down.  We didn't have time to stop at any of the stores, but we were approached by many vendors, mostly trying to make a quick few dollars selling us sombreros and hats with words like "Corona" embroidered on them.  The picture to the right shows a common "safety feature" added to fences in Mexico.  In the very corner of the picture you can just make out the edge of our bus.  This is apparently the only picture anyone in our group took of our tour bus!

Once on the bus, we pretty much had a non-stop narration of things about the Tulum Ruins, Mayans, and general things of that nature.  Our tour guide also told us not to buy the hand carved stone statues you would see in stores, as he personally carved some (and passed examples around) that he would sell to us for a better price.  They looked identical to all of the supposed "hand carved" stone statues you find in stores in Mexico, along with the accidentally left on "Made in China" stickers.  The tour guide also spent some time talking about the Mayan Calendar and pumping us up with how cool it was, so he could to try and sell you a birthday certificate of your own in the Mayan Calendar system.  

Once we arrived near the ruins, we were also warned to only shop in a particular store that was painted in yellow.  Our tour guides reasoning?  They allowed you to use their bathrooms for free, and he sort of implied that the other stores were very pushy, not as safe, etc.  I thought this was a little sketchy, but we did as our tour guide directed.

Now, according to the Disney website, there is a short walk from the bus drop-off point to the actual ruins.  The walk is about a mile long, or 15 minutes, and Disney says that this is not included in their price.  However, our tour guide gave all of us passes to ride this tram, so I'm not sure if Disney changed their policy or what.  To the left is a picture of the tram system.  It's basically a bunch of cars pulled by a big tractor.  There was a LOT of standing water at the boarding area.  You had to strategically jump across some well placed rocks/bricks to avoid getting soaking wet feet.

Another thing Disney promises that guests will receive is a headset that uses the "whisper system".  What Disney doesn't say that if there is inclement weather (also known as rain, which happens frequently in September) that the guides don't pass these out.  The headsets are supposed to allow you to focus on taking pictures but still hear what is going on.

The tour guide likes to lead you around to the various important sites, and in general talk quite a bit.  It was fine, and very informative, except I think way too much talking.  It was very hot and humid, so even standing in the shade you sweat quite a bit. I was tempted to wander off and do my own thing, but I did genuinely want to learn more about this amazingly beautiful site.  After about an hour, our tour guide let us go off on our own and we explored more of the areas that he didn't take us to.

There is a beach that you can access via stairway, which you can see in the picture to the right.  For some reason, however, the stairway was closed off and we weren't allowed to access the beach.  This was also slightly baffling, as Disney suggests in their excursion guide that guests bring a swim suit if they plan on swimming in the ocean while at the ruins.  Now, there was another portion of the beach closed off to tourists due to it being a prime turtle beach, but that doesn't explain why this portion was blocked off.  In the picture on the left you can see the fenced off turtle area beach.  I've heard other people say it was closed for them as well, but because of bad weather.  If the entire beach was closed due to turtle nesting, this is something that a Disney employee could have looked up and told guests before they departed on the excursion.  I was extremely disappointed that I was unable to get down in the sand and feel the water, and also upset that I missed the chance to take some spectacular ruins pictures from the ocean.

Here are some more photos from the ruins; there were tons of iguanas basking in the sunlight and on rocks here!

  

After we left the ruins, we took the tram back to the shopping area. Again, as instructed, we only shopped in the yellow store (I think it was labeled "Market" or something like that).  It was here that my sister realized she was sensitive to certain types of indoor lighting, and had the worst migraine of her life.  After a few minutes in the store, she grabbed my moms arm, started to shake, and told my mom she was having a hard time seeing (translate: couldn't see) and was going to throw up.  My mom quickly rushed her out of the store, where she leaned shakily against the building, trying to recover.  She did feel better after a bit, and walked around to some of the outdoor vendors, but was relieved when the bus arrived.  They were supposed to have our lunch on board (included in the price), and she was hungry.

Apparently it was just not my sisters day.  They only had ham sandwiches for everyone, along with a bag of chips, a juice box, a muffin and a banana.  My sister has quite a few allergies, along with being a vegetarian, which we told Disney employees.  They promised us that they would have something suitable for my sister when lunch time rolled around.  The only thing they had that she could eat was the bottle of water.  My sister is allergic to bananas and all poultry (this includes eggs), which rules out many bread products, such as muffins and sandwiches.  The tour guide acted like this was the first he heard of someone having an allergy and needing a different lunch (which it probably was), but didn't offer to do anything.  Finally the driver, a bit ungraciously said, well I can go get her a subway sandwich.  Luckily I brought some crackers (sealed) off the ship with me and she had a protein bar, or she would have been very hungry.  As a side note, be careful what you take of the ship; they are very strict about this, and you get get severely fined for taking off things like fruits.  That being said, if you are a picky eater, make sure to take snacks with you!

The ride back was fairly uneventful, if you don't consider my sister also getting carsick (or rather bus-sick) to be an event.  While my family loved seeing the ruins, we didn't appreciate the hospitality (or lack of it) from our tour guide/driver.  They seemed more interested in trying to sell you things and get a big tip than making sure you were enjoying yourself.  I was talking to our guide on the trip back, and he asked what my father did for a living.  I told him (my father is a retired environmental health specialist, also known as a health inspector), the guide just nodded like it was interesting.  Then his friend asked (in Spanish) where does he work?  And the guide responded (in Spanish) it's nothing important.  Now, I'm not fluent in Spanish by any means, but "trabajo", "nada" and "importante" are words just about any high school Spanish student understands.  For that reason alone, I told my parents that these guides didn't deserve a large tip from us, if any tip, at all.

Now, before people reading this think that this is a horrible trip to take and should avoid it, I want you to know that this was one of the best excursions I have ever taken.  Not because of mediocre tour guides, but because of the incredible scenery and history of the Tulum Ruins.  That, and Disney went above and beyond trying to make up this horrible (well, my sister said it was horrible, I quite enjoyed it) experience.

Excursion Rating: 7.5/10

The slightly lower rating is due to the bad tour operators.  We approached the Disney excursion planners (not sure of their official title on board) and told them of our experiences.  They said that there was some kind of miscommunication between them and the tour operators, because they did call and inform them of a food allergy and asked them to have something suitable for my sister.  However, they were unsure as to why we were told to only go into the "yellow market" store, or of all the random sales pitches we received en route to Tulum, and made a note of it to look into their current vendors, because that shouldn't have happened.

Disney Rating: 10/10

Disney went above and beyond apologizing to us, and in general were awesome.  They took down detailed notes of my sisters allergies and promised they would be in close contact with our next booked excursion with them (coming up in Jamaica).  Let's just say, they did not disappoint.  More details on how Disney showed us they care about their passengers and go out of their way to make you feel special and important in my next blog posting, when I cover our excursion in Falmouth, Jamaica.

For now, please enjoy more of the photos I took from the Tulum Ruins.

Thanks for reading!